CHICAGO, Ill. -- The University of Michigan football program had a pair of non-conference games selected for noon broadcast nationally, announced today (Friday, June 12) jointly by the networks and the Big Ten Conference. The Wolverines will host Oregon State (Sept. 12) in their home opener and a week later will play UNLV (Sept. 19) in their second of three straight games at Michigan Stadium.

Oregon State is on ABC, UNLV on BTN.

The Michigan noon kick was all but dead. I don't know if this is Hackett, Harbaugh, or random fate, but hooray for a few noon games that allow Michigan fans to see the rest of college football. 3:30 games on the 12th include Iowa-Iowa State and ND-Virginia; on the 19th Nebraska-Miami and Auburn-LSU are at 3:30. A number of other interesting games are likely to join those as the TV people figure out what they want and when.

Utah will host Michigan in Rice-Eccles Stadium in the 2015 season opener as a part of a home-and-home series that begins with a 2014 game in Ann Arbor. Michigan will make its first Salt Lake City appearance on Sept. 3, 2015 in a rare weekday game for the Wolverines, who have never played on a Thursday. The first game of the series is scheduled for Sept. 20, 2014 in Michigan Stadium.

Michigan becomes just the second Big Ten team ever to play in Salt Lake City. The Utes knocked off Indiana 40-13 in Rice-Eccles Stadium in 2002.

"A home-and-home series with Michigan is the kind of opportunity that comes with membership in the Pac-12 Conference," said Utah Director of Athletics Dr. Chris Hill. "I greatly appreciate Coach Whittingham's willingness to add college football's winningest program to his already difficult 2014 schedule, which will also feature five Pac-12 road games."

You'll note that the Wow Factor has been factor'd by playing in the Thursday night slot usually occupied by Mississippi State's latest flailing interception machine.

But wait, there's more! Michigan has released the entire 2015 nonconference schedule, which is as follows…

…and bits of the 2016 schedule, featuring ND, a home game against Colorado on September 17th and two TBAs likely to be punching bags. The Pac-12 agreement is tentatively scheduled to start the year after, so Michigan's eliminated ND-and-three-dwarves nonconference scheduling for the foreseeable future. That's a positive even if none of the teams incoming has much sex appeal.

But wait, there's more!

In addition, Michigan and Notre Dame will take a two-year hiatus in their long-standing rivalry during the 2018 and 2019 seasons. Both schools intend to resume the rivalry in the years following.

That may be "less," actually. We'll see if Michigan fills that slot with a quality opponent when the time comes.

Questions

Are those Oregon State and Colorado games one-offs? Or are they home and homes with return dates set for the distant future? (If one-offs: coup. If not, okay.)

If so can we expect the Oregon State and Colorado games to slot into that 2018 and 2019 ND hiatus along with the Pac-12 agreement? (If so: meh.)

When was the last time Michigan played three BCS-ish teams in a nonconference schedule, as they will in 2015? (A: 1997, when they played Baylor, Colorado, and ND. They also did so in 1996 (Colorado, BC, UCLA) and 1994 (BC, ND, Colorado).)